CHEAPER FOOD ON WAY AS PRICE WAR FINALLY HOTS UP

SUPERMARKETS are waging a war to drive prices down as food inflation finally starts to ease.

- Robert Kellaway

The battle to cut bills is much needed relief for shoppers hit by soaring energy and grocery costs.

Sainsbury's yesterday confirmed that food inflation was "starting to fall" and revealed that it has lowered prices on its 100 most popular products.

Rival chains are joining the fight, with Tesco reducing the cost of some 500 "essentials" and Ocado making 100 popular lines cheaper. Richard Hunter, head of markets at online platform Interactive Investor, said the cost cutting was evidence of a "new focus" on the fight to offer the cheapest prices.

He said: "Supermarkets are in a constant price war, it is the nature of the business.

"But whereas in the past the focus has also been on quality or the breadth of the offer or online shopping or sustainability, now the focus has definitely shifted.

"The likes of Tesco and Sainsbury's have been 'investing in price' as they put it. This is nothing short of an all-out effort to drive prices down as far as they possibly can."

Mr Hunter added: "The fact that the chief executive of Sainsbury's can see food price inflation falling is encouraging and the major supermarkets are passing on these cost savings to the consumer pretty quickly.

"The downside is that prices will not be returning to levels that we saw two years Prices are still going up, they're just not going up as fast as they were.

"Having said that, this is to be welcomed as a step in the right direction and hopefully will ease the cost-of-living crisis."

Pressure

Sainsbury's chief executive Simon Roberts yesterday spoke about the efforts that are being made to cut prices in the light of falling food inflation.